Note: I am so very interested in automatic writing and consider this my lucky day to be introduced to this book. I am sure many of you will agree.

Guest Article by Leonard Belmont

Do you remember when you knew you were falling in love?

Do you recall the thoughts, feeling and emotions you experienced when falling in love?

We have all read or hear love stories at one point or another, but this love is story is very different.

In this five part star-crossed love story, author Leonard Belmont takes us on an emotional journey with his automatic writings of the life of a young couple from the moment they laid eyes on each other.

“Five Years: The Meeting” is the lyrical, stream-of-thought tale of the first meeting and initial courtship of two young lovers.

Interestingly, the story begins at the end—you go into the book knowing that the love will end and that the narrator is in great pain as he longs for the woman who was the love of his life. From there, the narrative flashes into the past and recounts the first days of the relationship—from his spotting her in French class and falling instantly in love to the first date and the emotions surrounding it all. As they flirt and share interests, discovering more about each other, the relationship slowly blossoms—even as he (and you as a reader) worry at first that the girl is not as interested in him as he is in her, and that she has missed seeing the connection they could have.

Once you hit adulthood, you’ve probably experienced this instant chemistry with someone—and so the author’s strong feelings and amazement that he has found someone so perfect are very relatable. The sentences are thoughtful and precise, almost poetry, which also made this an enjoyable read from a more literary perspective. Small details in the text, such as the changing color of the girl’s hair throughout the seasons, are also really lovely: “The beauty of sunlight./Your hair transforming throughout the seasons./In summer, you seemed blonde, and during the winter darker, almost chestnut./By fall/The gold had started to rust.”

The delicacy of the language as well as the emotions of the story itself are what keep you reading—as does the mystery of why their romance ended, though I assume that will be revealed in later sequels to this work.

Recommended to readers who enjoy out-of-the-box prose and stories about the intensity of first love.